Harvesting Chaga, How to Store and Brew Tea
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- Опубліковано 13 бер 2019
- We head to a nearby Birch forest in search for Chaga and don't come home empty handed! We explain how we dry and store the Chaga and end the day with brewing a fresh batch of Chaga tea over the woodstove.
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Sweet video! When harvesting try to leave some Chaga behind, as the tree is now dependant on it.
Agreed, plus you can come back in 5 years and harvest again
Smells like chaga, its pretty unique
What is your evidence of this and the mycelium network is still intact inside the tree, it will grow back regardless 😉
@@dedkeny harvesting too much will leave the tree susceptible to infection and disease, often killing the tree = no future Chaga. Always leave 1 -2 inches.
Fake news. It's a parasite, the tree does not depend on the chaga.
Great video. We live in Northern Ontario and we have a lot of White and Yellow Birch in our area. I know a few spots where there is Chaga. Yes, leave some Chaga on the tree as it keeps on growing. I bought a high quality extendable pruning saw for and used to for the first time with great success. I do chop it up with a large chisel, in a deep wooden box. I then dry it in a food dehydrator on low heat. I also use a coffee grinder and get it into a fine powder, put it my coffee or tea, and I do ingest it. I've also made a red wine reduction with Chaga in a slow cooker on low heat.
When harvesting chaga it needs to be more in the middle of the winter and only take half so the other half will keep growing or you will kill it. Peeling birch bark off a tree in sheets will kill it especially now that the temps are warming up... And the sap will start running if it hasn't already.. Take from already down trees (the bark doesn't rot like the core does) and or when you clear your new property peel it on trees you take down. Just some suggestions.
Ak Washkeeton, we appreciate the chaga tips. I probably should have showed it but Eric was peeling birch bark off a dead birch not a live one. I want to try making some containers but will only be working with dead trees as I do not want to harm the live ones. Good advice for the new property!
@@SimpleLivingAlaska It doesn't hurt the tree unless you go all the way to the wood. People think it girdles the tree like when you remove a ring of bark to kill the tree. People love to comment that you're doing it wrong. I harvest bark on my property and know for a fact it does NOT harm the tree if done carefully. And birch poly pores are natures bandaid. Utsi the ice man was carrying this and horsehoof fungus , probably for fire starting. They are also still good if solid. Can be used for tea as well. Tastes like a mushroom tho.
Nice..! Did not know you could get those in Alaska ! Love Light and Wisdom 💚💚💚💚💚💚💚
When you're pecking it you should never take it all off the tree should always leave a little chunk on their otherwise it takes a long long long time for to go back
When we have 44 degrees in my country we are wearing coats, gloves and hats lol
people from Alaska are simply built different
That was a flying squirrel!
Yup we have them in northern NY too. Cute as hell.
Good job guys. Enjoy your free tea for months to come.
hey Ariel we are having so much fun following you two , looks like you have created a wonderful life we enjoy watching all your hard work and amazing experience s in Alaska, miss you here in Oregon blessings in all you do🌏
It's great stuff health wise.
That looked like a northern flying squirrel to me and probably partially eaten by an owl. Nature is wild! Keep on adventuring!
That's a flying squirrel!
OMG I love this
Thanks. Just got some today in the ADK. Take care.
Awesome video guys! We need to look for chaga. Looks like fun!
Oh what a blessing to be able to harvest chaga. Have been wanting to make medicinal tincture with it, but it is just too expensive for me to afford. Thank you for your wonderful videos.
Thanks for taking us along again! I love your trips and adventures! The dog was cute too!
Chaga!! I first learned about this from Dans Bois! It's cool that you guys have that there as well. This makes me want to try foraging for things around here.😀
Green Dream Project Alaska is full of wild edibles and it has been so much fun learning all of the different things we can eat! Thanks for watching guys 😀✌
old fashioned handheld coffee grinder.
It's funny I found you here.I have followed you on your channel from begin.love you guys l live this life but in Ontario Canada.
You can grind it in a manual coffee grinder - I even use a juicer and it works really well.
I live in alabama and would love to try this , I have seen alot about it and its benefits
chaga is amazing. vanilla.
You found Chaga!! Tip - drywall saw is a great harvest tool to ensure future harvests 😉
Dan Bois Homestead, thank you for the tip! We did leave some behind but maybe not as much as we should have in hindsight. There is quite a bit of conflicting info online but the general consensus is to not remove it all :)
@@SimpleLivingAlaska Just make sure you don't take anything from the middle part that's Inside the tree. You just cut off the exterior and you will be golden don't worry about how much you take from the outside. As long as you don't try to take out the middle part too , it will regrow in about 4-5 years. I harvest Chaga a lot and has been for almost 10 years now. I have been to my first spots 5 years later to re harvest the same exact Chaga. The ones I found initially wasn't that big so it re grew to it's former size but lets say you find one that is like a soccer ball size, well, it will take more then 5 years to reach that size again but in 4 -5 years there will be more to harvest at that spot unless the tree died before that time.
Maybe you could try a micro-plane zester/grater to do a fine grind? Or a coffee grinder? They make models that you can crank by hand, as well as the electric models... nice haul, there!
Nice. I have never heard of it.
You guys need to invest in snow shoes! 😄
Often the snow up here is so crystalized that snow shoes are too much trouble. The shoes slide sideways and get buried by the snow and just an energy drain. HOWEVER, sometimes they absolutely rock. I suspect they have snowshoes and the snow is wrong, especially if they are trying to walk in moose tracks (ouch).
Groovy!
👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Awesome
Never seen anyone drink their chaga so strongly concentrated!
Must taste like the earth.
Nice find, happy hunting.
Very cool.
On a sad note, my brother had to put his whippet down today. He was 20 years old. That’s a lot of dog years.
Great video guys. I don’t think as have chaga here. I’ve never seen it on any trees.
My Alaska Dream, I imagine you have lots of edible mushrooms where your at! We loved the PNW for that. That is very sad about your brother's pup, I wish ours would live to be that old! They are 10 so I'm hoping for several more years with them.
That was some deep snow that you guys were trudging through. Shorts and a tank top? Haha! I guess you were working pretty darn hard getting through that snow. I thought Eric was going to shimmy up that one tree for the treasure. Man, I'm envious of you guys and Dans Bois Homestead having that stuff around. We haven't seen any Birch trees in our immediate area. We heard that it's tasty to mix the Chaga powder in with hot chocolate so we want to try that. Gin just bought some but we need to go hunt for a source on some of the logging roads around here as soon as some of the snow melts. Nice haul guys.
Almost Homestead, that is a great idea, we mix it in with coffee too sometimes and have even tried it cold. That's awesome you have birch trees there, I don't remember seeing them in Oregon. We found quite a bit of chaga there but it is not as prevalent in some areas. Take care!
You have birch canker in Alaska? I though is was a thing here in Northern Scandinavia but I should've guessed that things that grow on birch trees here, grow on birch trees everywhere. Its cool to watch something American with so "American typical" cultured people in a climate (although further south and you have day/night all year and such) so close to my own. Its funny as here, we usually categorize Americans as "Southerners" in terms of which kind of culture you guys are. Closer to like South Europeans. But you seem to live quite natural and organic lives and not at all materialistic or consumeristic or "comfy-loving" lifestyles.
we have this stuff all over our forest in the ADKs. Been drinking it for about a year now as a tea. my son drinks the tinctured stuff that we bought but I think he does so for the vodka! lol
Chaga is quite common here in Norther NY and New England mostly on Yellow Birch and some on White Birch. I thought Chaga was a nutty flavor. Our dogs get Chaga tea every day. Here in the central Adirondacks we are also in zone 3 and find snow shoes a must along with back country skis.
You can use your meat grinder to process the chaga.
I just found a big chunk on a recent hike up in Maine. It's definitely dry by now so breaking it up might be tougher but it's cool to know I don't have to do too much to make it useable after that. How hot do you steep it?
after you used chaga for tea steeping save the chaga for fire-lighting (once it is dried out again), chaga is a wonderful tinder fungus. It embers very hot and is almost impossible to put out.
Hahaha! We are going to go try to get more, Eric is like, "we? Ariel must have a mouse in her pocket!" Eric waist deep in snow. 😂🤣😂 I'd like to try some, no birch trees around here. 🙄🤔
I've got friends in Fox, they always have a couple pounds of Chaga for me, each month.
I drink Chaga Tea by the Gallon .
I usually have 8 to 12 gal. Of Chaga in the rig at any time
James Pangborn we love chaga! But i think coffee is still my favorite☕😀
Hi guys
Do you know that you can also harvest sap from birch trees? Simply clip off an 1/8 " to 1/4 " branch and tie a small container onto the cut end.... 10 hours later you will have a full container of spring birch sap 🙂
Birch water as well.
That looked fun. Never had it before. Does it taste like anything else? All I drink for tea here is mint.. Have a great day you two..!!
living Off Grid McGarvey style,Yum! Mint tea is a favorite of mine. We can't quite pinpoint it but it tastes earthyish.
chaga should be taken when temps are below 0 when the sap has came down, when it warms up it flushes the nutriments back up the tree, the polly spore you had also has benifits of chaga, slow seep it in a crock pot..
Donn Burge, thanks for the tips as always, we are learning. I wasn't quite sure if that was a polyspore.
that's what the parrots say, I doubt its true.
"learn your land" on Facebook is thee most knowledgeable self taught person I have ever seen.
So the way I have been using chaga for about 5 years is 1.find/harvest the chaga, 2. Let it dry for a day or 2 then smash it into small chunks, 3. Use a magic bullet blender to grind it, 4. Put the powder on coffee filters and put it in a dehydrator for like 24 hrs, then bottle it in mason jars, then put a scoop into empty tea bags you can get on amazon, and simmer it in a pot of water for 10 minutes.
My friends dad gave me some that's a few years old. Is it still good to use? I'm totally new to this.
Good afternoon
Chaga!!!!
Greetings from Delta Junction! How many times can chaga be used to make tea before it is "used up" and needs to be replaced with fresh? I've heard of folks putting chunks in the tea pot and leaving them in there for several brewings... Thanks!
It looks like you managed to keep the cats out of the seed trays : ) I know with my dogs there is NO question as to if they are coming out with me. lol It's every time, every where. : ) Best wishes Paul
Hunt Shack Wilderness Experience, Us too! They enjoy the trips, we have been lucky so far with the cats...:)
Leave some to grow back looks to me your taking it all
ERIC .....what do you use to sharpen your kitchen knives !!!
I seen a video where you had some nice looking tea in a french coffee pot can you tell us what was in that one . i believe it was the last of the video where you were going off to bed .
what camera do you use for the video? really enjoy your videos. thanks
inthewoods10 we use a canon 80d.
Have you guys considered growing your own mushrooms? Oyster, shiitake, and plenty of other mushrooms grow well on logs you probably have plenty of access to, and continue to produce for several years.
jrosborn77, yes we would like to although I don't know if it is a project we will get to this year :)
They are even growing morels now.
👍👍👍
If you store it in jars, put a small cloth with rice in it too, will absorb moisture. I make a decoction, let it simmer on the absolute lowest setting on my stove, for about 30 minutes. Also look for birch polypore on birch trees only. Medicinally used as well. You can make tincture out of it or decoction. Tastes bitter and just gross, but it has many health benefits. Birch polypore needs to be taken when mature, but not old. If it has a thin white layer of mold on it, do not consume it at all! Dry it until it's like crackers and you can snap it, then store in jars with a bit of rice or make a powder, or you can make a tincture with 97 or 98 degree alcohol. If you have a wound, birch polypore will heal that a lot faster. Take a fresh slice and apply it to the wound and keep it there for a few hours or mix a bit of powder with a drop of water and apply it on the wound. I make a decoction of birch polypore and ginger when I have the flu and it works like a charm. If the birch polypore decoction is not bitter, your polypore is too young. Happy hunting!
The smelly one looked like dead chaga to me. It should just have a woody smell. Your smelling fermentation. Probably won't hurt you but yeah. Should have bright golden and yellow colors , with white near the tree. As soon as you started crumbling it with your fingers i knew . And when i saw the dark interior with a little orange i was sure. I pick these sometimes if the packs light and use them for bug repelant incense. Sometime the trees defences defeat the chaga.
Pole climbers. I used to wear them to climb old telephone poles to take down the lines to get the copper.
Vicki Takacs, we actually saw folks with long sticks and blades at the end for chaga harvesting in the winter. Great idea :)
@@SimpleLivingAlaska You brought back a great memory for me with that comment. My dad used to wear stilts to paint. What I wore are leather straps with a sharp gaff that fits on the inside part of your foot. It's akin to strapping on a big claw. Those things and money they brought in were sorely needed at the time. I'd do them before I'd do stilts. You have your boots dug in to the pole and you are hanging on with both arms, but with stilts, well it's a long way to the ground. I remember even using those to cut the top of a pine tree off for a Christmas tree. My dad was a sight and very good at the stilt walking too. I'll have to ask my stepmom if she ever saw him doing that. Big hug Ariel and thank you. duckduckgo.com/?q=pole+climbers&atb=v94-1&iax=images&ia=images&iai=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.forestry-suppliers.com%2FImages%2FOriginal%2F1664_27191_p1.jpg Maybe my dad and me were in a circus act in a previous life, lol.
snow shoes!
This was very interesting. Thanks. 💕. NonnaGrace
Hi, was it birch trees the Chaga was growing on? If so could it be tapping into the sap and that is why it smells sweet?
H2Dwoat yes they grow on Birch trees and that could be possible why it smells sweet but we don't take chaga that's deep and in the wood and when we tapped the trees this spring we did have to drill about one and a half inches to access the sap so I am not quite sure but we enjoy the chaga tea ☺
Does Chaga feel velvety on the outside?
When you take the chaga off, do you leave any on the tree ?
Thomas Schauss, we do leave a little, Eric also tries to not cut into the Chaga deeply, just take what protrudes from the tree :)
The animal at 2:30 is a Northern Flying Squirrel.
Hey, my buddy Mike told me about your channel. I just found some chaga out by the Susitna today, i chopped it up like the you said, and I’m going to let it dry for a couple days. Is there anything weird to look out for? Like spores or fungus growing on it within the next couple days as it dries?
Hammerheart Outdoors, hello! Glad to hear from you! We are new to harvesting chaga as of this season. I accidently didn't dry some of the chaga out right away, that we previously harvested, and it developed some small white mold spots but I it placed next to our woodstove and wiped the spots off and researched if it was okay. From what I found it was okay for consumption. I believe all you need to do is dry it out relatively soon after harvesting until completely dry prior to storing. Hope that helps, we appreciate you watching. Glad you found some chaga :) Also I might add that we have found it is best to harvest from living trees only.
Simple Living Alaska do you need to dry it by a stove? Or is air drying it fine?
Hammerheart Outdoors, I would think air drying is fine, that is how we dried our first batch in our cabin.
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Would a Mortar and Pestle work to crush the chaga at all? If it can powder star anise and cinnamon quills etc then it should be able to powder the chaga. Worth a try anyway. Michelle
bohemiangypsy99, I bet it would. I think it is common to use a blender. A mortar and pestle would be great for herbs!
A mortar and pestle is good for all types of things including making my Thai curry pasted and grinding all my whole spices to powders. I have three in different sizes. I prefer them over blenders actually lol.
Hey what part of Alaska are you in I’m kenai
Nice to learn about changa - but isn’t harmful for the trees? You know best. Teach me. I like to learn from you 👍
I know this is an older video, but what's it like?
First thought snowshoes
Please send some chaga! I drink that stuff 2 to 3 times a day.
And now it's time to trip balls.
FLYING SQUIRREL I THINK OR A PINE MARTIN ONE YOUR THEY OTHER.. I GRIND CHAGA IN AN OLD HAND CRANK MEAT GRINDER.. ALOHA
Richard Sabean, it totally was a flying squirrel (we looked it up). Great guess! Good tip for grinding Chaga ;)
@@SimpleLivingAlaska THATS FUNNY,, I HAVE 2 IN MY BIRD FEEDER RIGHT THIS MINUTE,, IT'S 2;45 AM HERE IN MAINE GOT UP TO STOKE THE WOOD STOVE, TAKE A SQUIRT, LOOK OUT AT MY FEEDERS.. FIRST TIME I'VE SEEN A PAIR WHERE I LIVE NOW.. THEY ARE NIGHT FEEDERS,, I'VE SEEN EM EARLY WHEN DEER HUNTING , SITTING IN A TREE STAND AT DAYLIGHT.. ALOHA
don't take all the chaga, leave some behind to allow it to grow back!
How was it? Does it taste mushroomy or woody?
mindyourownbusiness they have a slight cinnamon taste :)
Interesting, never heard of it/Chaga, before until I started watching My Self Reliance, does it taste like anything in particular? .. :-) have you guys thought of investing in show shoes up there? lol
Barbara Lambert chaga has a slight cinnamon flavor it is very good 😀 haha yes we do need some snow shoes for next winter!
That’s a flying squirrel
Need some tree climbing spikes.
I was told not to take the entire chunk of Chaga off the tree when harvesting - it could kill the entire tree if you do. Don’t know if this is true or not. Better to be safe than sorry.
Love your dogs, please spoil them.
Snow shoes
You let it cool ,,,, ? Is it not as tasty when hot ?
Who knew.
You guys could definitely sell this!! It goes anywhere from $20 to $2,000 a pound!!
You are not supposed to take the whole chunk fyi… take 50% max so it can reproduce… :)
you guys also need to learn about your wildlife. how about a flying squirrel?
nice chaga, but you guys take too much off. at least 15-20% should remain so they can grow back. :)
Snow shoes. Seriously.
This was torturous watching you mistreat medicinal trees...use a saw, and leave some behind to regrow. you literally killed entire trees by taking too much of the Chaga.